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I knew she was talking about dancing, but her words triggered memories that I had long since buried under a thousand gulps of whiskey. Memories we didn't share.

I couldn't help it. The guilt just hit me.

Fuck. I really shouldn't have let her go alone.

“Stay where you are. I'm coming.”

I didn't hesitate for long and hung up, moving faster than any human eye could follow to my car, not exactly parking out quietly, and making my way to The Docks, the new club that had opened a few weeks ago in the Blairville Harbor industrial area.

Olivia McConnell was my responsibility. And I wouldn't forgive myself if anything happened.

Chapter 26

Bayla

Hysteresis

Angus MacRae

Emely and I had returned to Copeland Estate separately. Or rather, she had insisted on giving me a ride, but had let me drive her car for the last mile so that it would look like she had just come back from a run and I had borrowed her car to drive downtown.

We had to be really quiet. Or rather, I had to be quiet, because when I entered the almost dark house, I knew that most people were either in bed or out hunting somewhere in the woods in the form of giant predators.

So quiet and dark, the estate seemed almost deserted. There were only dim lights in the hallway, casting a pleasant ambience.

The huge antlers above the door projected pointed shadows, as if claws were lurking there in the darkness, eagerly waiting to drag me to the hidden abyss of this town. Their animal skulls reminded me of the strangely beautiful masks in the secret tower room.

As quietly as I could, I sneaked through the hallways, and for the first time, they seemed far too long.

Not until I reached the upper floor of the wing where my room was located, where oil paintings on the wall depicted large wolves hunting through the forests of Blairville, did my nervousness subside.

I stopped in front of one of the paintings, adjusted the brown leather backpack slung over my shoulder, and looked at the dramatic cliffs covered with dark, fog-ridden conifers and the raging, violent sea with its crashing waves and pointed rock formations.

My gaze fixed on the barely visible signature in the corner and remained there.

Indeed...

VR.

Carefully, I reached out my index finger toward the dried oil paint on the canvas, but paused when I spotted the black butterfly fluttering through the hallway as if it had lost its way here.

First, it approached the painting, then my finger... and settled on it.

I held my breath.

The wings of the ghostly creature, which I had never seen anywhere except in the Copeland Woods, shimmered and gleamed, and only when I looked more closely did I discover the gold-leaf-like layer at the base of the wings, which began to flake off toward the tips, turning into a delicate layer of golden dust.

“Such a beautiful creature,” I whispered, leaning forward as carefully as possible so as not to scare the insect away.

“A nightshade.”

Startled, I flinched, causing the butterfly to fly off from my finger, and jerked my head around to discover Alarik in the hallway behind me.

His short, wavy hair was tousled. He was wearing a navy-blue merino sweater over a matte-blue shirt with a slightly crooked collar, paired with black chinos and his brown leather Oxfords.

The light from the dimmed wall lamps flickered through his green eyes.

My pulse didn't quite know whether to slow down or speed up.